“This afternoon, I’m picking up my younger daughter from school and I’m taking her someplace special. It’s a place she and I can look at works by local artists, where we can read quietly together, where we almost always run into friends. It’s one of best places in the world. You’ve probably got something like it where you live too. It’s called the library. Libraries are not terribly fashionable. You’d think they would be. In a world in which educated, enlightened, planet-hugging types are all up in that composting and upcycling and no impact lifestyle, these wonderful places where you can just borrow stuff and then bring it back so someone else can enjoy it somehow languish. Last year was the first year in several that New York City libraries didn’t face any budget cuts – though branches shut after Hurricane Sandy remain unrestored. Libraries in Detroit have been shuttered in the city’s economic crisis. In the U.K., libraries face closures as the number of people using them plummets.” (via Salon.com)